


the other night dear, as i lay sleeping, i dreamed i held you in my arms

by notjodieyet



Category: Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: F/M, Gallifrey, I promise, I'm lazy, Other, Promise, Shh, Thoschei, angsty one shot, dream - Freeform, fight me, i don't know anything about gallifrey can you tell, i'm a little in love with the thirteenth doctor, like actually thoschei, my title game is still strong, no i haven't watched any of the thirteenth doctor either, no i've never watched classic who why do you ask, yeah i did name this after a song
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-20
Updated: 2020-01-20
Packaged: 2021-02-27 09:08:48
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,095
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22334707
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/notjodieyet/pseuds/notjodieyet
Summary: the other night dear, as i lay sleeping, i dreamed I held you in my armsbut when I awoke, dear, i was mistakenso i hung my head and i criedaka i am overly dramatic again and the doctor's subconscious is sick of her
Relationships: The Doctor/The Master (Doctor Who)
Comments: 6
Kudos: 26





	the other night dear, as i lay sleeping, i dreamed i held you in my arms

The Doctor was kneeling in the rusty red Gallifreyan grass, hands clasped together, praying to a god she didn’t know.

She’d had this dream before, her knees bent in front of a white marble statue, its head broken off, its wings chipping and splintered. This time around, she was wearing a gauzy dress that fell long over her wrists and draped over her fingertips.

“You look ridiculous.”

The Doctor looked behind her, seeing Missy in the same garb, but with a shimmering tiara perched within her hair. “You do too,” she said, standing and brushing her palms on the soft fabric of her dress.

Missy sniffed. “I know. I have to show you something.”

The Doctor slipped her hand into Missy’s. The other Time Lord’s skin was cold, soft, calloused, welcome.

They walked together, across the impossibly long field, before they came to a cliff. The Doctor squeezed her eyes shut, already anticipating the view, but Missy’s fingers were already stroking her cheek, gently prying her eyes open.

A fire was consuming the city below. It wasn’t a city the Doctor knew, but it was populated by buildings she did — there, the London restaurant she’d eaten fish and chips at with a girl after bringing her to the destruction of her planet; there, a hospital she’d kissed a doctor in on the moon; there, an art gallery where a ginger-haired painter sobbed at his own work.

The fire licked at the sides of the walls, climbing up the cliff, spilling into a turquoise sea that stretched to the orange horizon. The Doctor searched for Missy’s fingers in the empty air, but found nothing; the woman was gone.

She looked next to her, and found the Master instead. Which regeneration had she been on when she knew him? Something early, she thought.

“You burned it,” she gasped, as smoke drifted up past the cliff and twisted inside her lungs. “You burned it all.”

He didn’t deny it.

She tried to lunge at him, but her feet were stuck to the ground, and the Master laughed. “It’s always been me, darling.”

“You didn’t call me that. Not like this.”

“I know.”

And then they were inside, suddenly, a large empty warehouse, and there was a sword in her hand, and nothing in his. She knew how to use this.

The Doctor found herself in a familiar dance — him ducking, her slashing, him dodging, her winning. His back was up against the grey, grey wall, her blade just barely brushing his neck. “Say you’re sorry, you bastard.”

He grinned. “Never.”

“Say you’re —”

He was gone again, replaced with another him, and this one was crying. Crying and smiling. “Say you’re sorry first, darling.”

“I know you didn’t call me that.”

“Say you’re sorry.”

“There’s nothing to apologize for.” She pressed the sword more sharply against his neck. “I’m going to kill you.”

He died before she could say anything else, dissolving into golden flecks.

And then he was behind her, and next to her, and in front of her, so many _him_ s — he had lived so many lives, destroyed so many people.

“Go away,” she gasped. “I’ll fight all of you — every single one… I’ve done it before.”

“We know,” said a young boy, smiling like everything was going to be all right. Spoiler alert, she wanted to tell him, it wasn’t.

“You destroyed it. You destroyed it all.”

A Master took her hand again, and the others disappeared. This one was more recent. She was on her eleventh? tenth? regeneration when she knew him. Who knew which one of his it was. “Let’s go see something,” he said, gently.

“No. Wait.”

It was too late. The world was gone again, replaced with the viewing window of a spaceship.

The Master took her to a chair, and sat her down.

Her planet was burning in the darkness of space outside, an inferno of red and guilt and orange and awful, twisting memories, and deaths and gold and first loves, and families and forgetting and the end of everything.

“You did this,” she said, huskily, all the energy sapped out of her. She was a shell in a white dress, her previous prayers lying broken on the ground, whatever goddess they’d been directed to having met some wrenchingly terrible fate.

“We’re more similar than you think.”

“We aren’t the same, Master.”

And the Master leaned forward, and kissed her.

When he was finished, he simply stood back and looked her over. “You have anything to say?”

“You’re right.” She wiped at her lips a little, the tingling feeling a pale reflection of his kiss in reality, and slumped in on herself. “Take me somewhere else.”

“I’m right about what?”

“You’re right. I destroyed it all. It’s all my fault.”

“And?”

“And I’m an awful person. And I’m the same as you.”

He smirked.

“And I’m in — and I l— I’m so sick of this dream, Master, please.”

The Master said, “You know there’s something else you have to admit to yourself. Doctor.”

“You’re wrong.”

“Oh, Doctor.”

“Let me wake up. I’m so sick of this.”

The Master started to laugh, a cackling, birdlike noise, and he said, “Doctor, Doctor, you murderer, you gorgeous, gorgeous killer.”

“Shut up.”

“You finished an entire planet. Who does that?”

“You.”

“And you’ve always wanted somebody like you, Doctor, haven’t you? You’ve _always_ wanted me.”

“I’m going to wake up now.”

He kept cackling, kept laughing, kept taunting her, until her eyes snapped open.

* * *

Yasmin was sitting on her bed, reading a purple-covered book, humming a catchy song under her breath. She glanced over as the Doctor woke up. The Doctor felt as if she was being flung from a rubber band slingshot instead of waking up from a particularly odd dream.  
A particularly odd dream she’d had every night this week.

“Good morning, Doctor. Graham made breakfast.”

 _You’ve always wanted somebody like you, Doctor. You’ve_ always _wanted me._

“Yeah. Morning,” she said, blinking away the Master’s voice echoing in her head, and yawning widely. “Why are you here?”

“You slept in. We were worried.”

“I don’t sleep in.” The Doctor squirmed out of bed, ran her fingers through her hair, and pulled her clothes out of the drawer.

Yaz averted her eyes as she pulled off her now-too-big nightshirt. “I’ll wait for you in the kitchen.”

“Yeah.”

She paused in the doorway. “Did you have a nightmare, Doctor?”

“No,” said the Doctor. “Don’t worry about me, Yaz. Don’t worry about me.”

_You’ve always wanted somebody like you, Doctor._

_You’ve always wanted me._


End file.
